After the first full week of November with 40-50 mph winds gusting most of one day, it seemed all the leaves had fallen, the colors had faded and a gray gloom had settled into northern Illinois.
But a walk through an oak/hickory woodland on a clear, cold November day revealed many marvels including smells and visions not available during spring, summer and even early fall.
The woods were in Old School Forest Preserve in Libertyville. Immediately upon entering, I noticed a scene that begged for an artist to set up an easel and paint. The sun was shining on thousands of puffs of white glistening atop many 25-inch thin stalks deep into the woods. The white puffs were goldenrod blooms that had gone to seed. They were every bit as lovely as the ephemeral wildflowers that appear on the forest floor in spring.
I also noticed a shorter, less common plant amid the goldenrods. A close look showed that the seed heads contained threadlike thin long hairs. I touched the seed heads, and tiny, brownish-white puffs fell softly on my skin. This is a cinnamon willow-herb native to northern Illinois. The plant actually got its name from the cinnamon-hued hairs that carry the seeds into the wind. The plant’s small white or pink flowers often bloom well into October, but it is only after the blooms are spent that you can closely view the unusual seed heads.
Brown, decaying oak leaves covered much of the forest floor, but occasionally I saw some short plants with maroon-colored leaves. Some of these were oak saplings. Others were poison ivy. It’s easy to identify the three-leaved plant with red leaves in autumn standing out amid brown, decaying leaves of other plants. Avoiding poison ivy in the summer is not so easy when so many other green leaves of various plants are crowding it.
The leaves, saplings and poison ivy were surrounded by giant sculptures in shades of brown and white, with different textures. Yes, the trees. Each species has its own shape, bark patterns and architectural style.
The bur oak’s heavy dark bark appears on twisting and turning branches, seemingly getting entangled while reaching for the sky. The peeling bark of the shagbark hickory, now leafless, could be seen all the way from the ground up to its top at 40 feet or higher. Another tree with smooth white bark had tiny, evenly spaced holes in even lines on its trunk. This was the work of the yellow-bellied sapsucker, a woodpecker that drills these holes, then drinks the sappy liquid that emerges.
The sun’s rays dipped on and around the trees, casting shadows some places and bright light elsewhere.
Amid the quiet and the aloneness (no one else was there), I heard a white-breasted nuthatch give its soft “yank, yank” call. A little later, a few blue jays interrupted the silence with their cranky calls. When blue jays get vocal in the woods, it could mean there’s an owl nearby. The owl is trying to sleep or roost during the day, but the blue jays like to harass it. These jays, however, stopped their calling quickly and there was no sign of an owl nearby.
Blue jays hang around woods in winter if there are plenty of acorns, but I didn’t see many acorns and wondered why. I decided to get on the ground and pull back the wet crumpled leaves to reveal the moist, crumbly soil. That’s where I discovered acorns, some of them just with the tops and not the body. Several brown grape-like berries clung to a vine on the ground.
Food is easy to see atop the seed heads of goldenrods in the November forest, but other food is hidden and the birds and mammals know where and how to find it.
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The noisiest bird was the red-bellied woodpecker, calling several notes as it flew from a dead tree to an oak tree to a hickory tree, and got involved in a short skirmish with a jay.
The woodpecker, the blue jay and the nuthatch call these woods home year-round. When I hear them in the colder months, it’s like a friendly hello, a reminder that life is not so bleak. Hearing one of these birds in winter is as comforting as is the peace you’ll find walking in the woods in November.
Sheryl DeVore has worked as a full-time and freelance reporter, editor and photographer for the baiduhai and its subsidiaries. She’s the author of several books on nature and the environment. Send story ideas and thoughts to [email protected]